Social Engineering Techniques - Computer Definition

Include glancing over authorized
users’ shoulders to see their password entries; recording authorized users’ login keystrokes on video cameras;
searching for password notes under authorized users’ desktop pads; calling
system operators and saying that one is an employee who forgot his or her
password and asking for the legitimate ­password; going through trash cans and
collecting loose pieces of paper with passwords on them; searching for authorized users’ passwords by reading email messages stored on company
computers; and guessing different combinations of personally meaningful
initials or birth dates of authorized users—their likely passwords.

Though there were all sorts of high-tech conjectures about
how Paris Hilton’s cell phone was exploited in February 2005, a piece appearing
in The Washington Post online
on May 18, 2005, indicated that the exploit may have relied on very basic
social engineering techniques—­combined with vulnerabilities in the Website of
Hilton’s cell phone provider, T-Mobile International. A young cracker involved
in the cell phone information heist told the reporter that he was part of an
online group that succeeded in its crack attack only after one member tricked—using
his social engineering techniques—a T-Mobile employee into
releasing information not supposed to be in the public domain. Though
protecting the minor’s identity, the reporter said that the young cracker
provided him with evidence supporting the claim, including screen shots of what
he maintained were internal T-Mobile computer network pages.